Dear Friends,
How was your Lord’s day yesterday? I hope it was as blessed as mine was. We had a great message on the resurrection and what it means to us. So today’s devotional will take you down a similar path. God bless you.

Because of Calvary,
John Janney

• John 14:19 (ESV)

  19 Yet a little while and the world will see me no more, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live.

BECAUSE HE LIVES

“God sent His Son, they called Him Jesus,

He came to love, heal, and forgive;

He lived and died to buy my pardon,

An empty grave is there to prove my Savior lives.

How sweet to hold a newborn baby,

And feel the pride, and joy he gives;

But greater still the calm assurance,

This child can face uncertain days because He lives.

And then one day I’ll cross the river,

I’ll fight life’s final war with pain;

And then as death gives way to victory,

I’ll see the lights of glory and I’ll know He lives.

Because He lives I can face tomorrow,

Because He lives, all fear is gone;

Because I know He holds the future,

And life is worth the living just because He lives.”

[William J. and Gloria Gaither]

“Bill Gaither recalls the circumstances that prompted the writing of this favorite: ‘We wrote “Because He Lives” after a period of time when we had had a kind of dry spell and hadn’t written any songs for a while… Also at the end of the 1960s, our country was going through some great turmoil with the height of the drug culture, and the whole ‘God is Dead’ theory was running wild in our country. Also it was the peak of the Vietnam war. During that time our little son was born ― at least Gloria was expecting him. I can remember at the time we thought, ‘Brother, this is really a poor time to bring a child into the world.’ At times we were even quite discouraged by the whole thing. And then Benjy did come. We had two little girls whom we love very much, but this was our first son, and so that lyric came to us, “How sweet to hold our new-born baby and feel the pride and joy he gives, but better still the calm assurance that this child can face uncertain days because Christ lives.” And it gave us the courage to say, “Because Christ lives we can face tomorrow” and keep our heads high.’” [Kenneth W. Osbeck, Amazing Grace: 366 Inspiring Hymn Stories for Daily Devotions, (Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, 1990), p. 129]